


memories & (ugly) cigarettes

by bonjourmags



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst, College, Fluff, M/M, Memory Loss, Teenagers, this is just me trying to b poetic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-27
Updated: 2018-03-27
Packaged: 2019-04-13 18:17:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14118138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bonjourmags/pseuds/bonjourmags
Summary: Bill Denbrough forgot about them. All six of them.  His memory was like a paper with a phone number written on it, waiting in the rain, water drops erasing the numbers, slowly, surely.  IT, Derry, the losers, all of that was gone. Whenever he sees one of them in the halls of the University of Maine, he thinks they're from his dreams, or from stories he wrote.That's how he falls for Stanley Uris. For the second time.





	memories & (ugly) cigarettes

**Author's Note:**

> this is for livia. she's the one who puts the st in stenbrough

Bill Denbrough forgot about them. All six of them. It was as if he was struck by some mystery - black magic, his dad would've joked if he ever mentioned the subject - but to Bill, it was simple magic. The memories were in his head and heart, all warm and kept in a watched safe, then, within days, they faded until he had no perception of them anymore. He couldn't remember how Beverly's red hair used to float in the hot wind of summer, how Eddie's eyes light up whenever they played cop and bandit, how Ben used to think about plans to create hide-places, the sound of Stan's bike falling in front of his house whenever he came to visit, how incredibly big Richie's eyes were in his glasses, how soft was Mike's voice before he hit puberty. 

 

Leaving Derry meant leaving them behind, he knew it when his mom told him that they were moving out - but he was far from thinking that leaving would turn him into a bliss of memory loss, without a glimpse of his old friends. He had no idea that, in a way, IT was still around - playing with them, toying them, forcing them to forget to finally break up the charm that glued the seven of them together. His memory was like a paper with a phone number written in the rain, water drops erasing the pieces, slowly, surely. That must be the reason why Beverly never sent a single letter to them, why they waiting for weeks before thinking that she got bored of them, that they were summer friends but not more. She probably couldn't remember their addresses, names, or even their existence.

 

Bill didn't realize that he was losing his pre-teen memories as the car was leaving big old Derry. The only thought that came through was that the weather was nice for middle spring, and that he was about to start things again. New place, new life, but he wanted to stay with a foot stuck in his old place, old life : writing letters to his friends, never leaving them behind, never break the red string between their fingers. He was fine with not remembering, in a way, because he didn't know. It couldn't hurt if he had no idea of what he had lost, he just thought his memory was bad during a few years, and his parents were always too busy to tell him anything. Not like they could even remember Bill's friends' names anyway, or maybe they still know Eddie's - but surely not Ben's, or Mike's, or Beverly's.

 

Forgetting the losers club didn't hurt, and that was the most important part.

 

***

Bill grew to be the son that his parents always wanted to have. That was normal, because he did everything to please them. He got into the football team, which wasn't his big-thing, but he couldn't help but feel his heart ache (in a good way, such a good way) when his dad was telling him that he was proud. Of course, he wasn't the star of the team - he didn't want to, and he couldn't be, but he was a part of it, and that's all that mattered. He was also in the lecture club, and that was all for him (it still made his parents proud, he was the kid with good grades, the one that gave a lot of time to focus on school, the one that was in a sports team, the one reading whenever he had time to). 

 

A small voice used to tell him that his parents weren't like that before, and that the house was supposed to be ice that he couldn't break whenever they ate together, but he would hush that voice since he couldn't remember these days. All he knew was the present: and how his parents encouraged him to be who they wanted him to be: smart, sporty. If that made them happy, he was okay with that. 

 

"It's funny, you don't stutter anymore. It's been years, but I'm just realizing this now." His mother once said, cutting tomatoes while Bill was helping her to make salad. He picked his lips. "I used to stutter?" he says, searching through his memory. She stops, a second, dries her hands in a towel before brushing her son's hair. "Yes, William, you used to. A lot. You don't remember? It was because of your car accident. Maybe you still have problems and that's why you don't remember. I'll call a doctor tomorrow morning, to check if everything is fine." She says quietly, explaining everything. She stops, "You do remember Derry, right honey?" she asks. 

 

"Yeah, of course." He lies.

 

The visit at the doctor is fine, and nothing is wrong. It's normal - you can't find something that isn't there. 

 

College years go by, he dates a girl, then another, then he decides to stay with her for more than a year then they just leave each other without actual reasons, the just got bored of each other. He looks at boys and he thinks that they look great but he doesn't act on it. He's not closeted, but he doesn't want to scream it to anyone. He's seventeen, it's 1992, people are open, it's fine, but he doesn't want it to define him. He's Bill Denbrough, and doesn't want to be Bill Denbrough - The Gay/Bi Guy. Plus he's not sure that Zack Denbrough would be happy with the news of having a bi son, and his parent's happiness comes first. 

 

When his aunt asks what he wants to do after high school, if he's ready to work, he says that he's going to study more. He planned to study at the University of Maine, in Orono. He doesn't know why, but he think Maine is attractive, and his mother tells him that it's because he still has his memories of his childhood creeping on him, asking, like a silent plea to get him back there. He smiles, but he's not sure it's that. He doesn't remember. He thinks that UMaine is good and that there's a lot of people that will study over there, and he heard that the literature course is pretty good. He wants to study so he can have a diploma, just in case he doesn't win enough money as a writer. 

 

He wants to leave his parents, too, because he wants to grow out of the little cocoon that the three of them built, he wants to live alone in a small dorm room, he wants to cook his own meal even if it's bad pasta or frozen pizzas, he doesn't care, he just wants to get away and live for himself - not that he dreams of completely abandon his parents, but he wants to start being an adult, or actually a pre-adult. He had no memory of being a pre-teen, he wanted to create many of being a pre-adult. He wants to drink, and it wouldn't matter if he was underage because everyone in college drank like they were seconds away from the apocalypse, he wants to laugh in someone's room without telling to his parents that he's "home soon, don't worry," he wants to be able to work until the sun starts to shine, he wants to buy low-quality sandwiches to a cute girl that's just his age, he wants to find a cute boy at his bus stop, he wants to live simple things, but he wants to be with himself, be free.

 

He thinks that UMaine is a good start to all of that.

 

***

He may have dreamed of a room in which he lives alone, but he ends up living with another boy, because the dorms are made that way. It's not big, but it isn't small - there's a room for each of them, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a common room in which he passes most of his time, working, since that's were the biggest window is. The boy is named Mathew, and he likes him. When he talks he's loud, when he laughs he's even louder, and it makes Bill feel alive. He doesn't mind sharing a place to live with him, and even if they don't take the same courses, they have plenty to say to each other. 

 

The cute girl that sells low-quality sandwichs isn't cute, but more like a very proper kind of person, and it's not a girl. Bill hears the servers talking as he waits for his order, and listens with attention. He's a writer at heart - he always tries to spy discretely on people, he wants to discover personalities, he feels like he needs to. 

 

"So, why do you work? I thought you were a student," asks a server-lady to the boy, who is making his sandwich, "Well, I couldn't get any money from the state but I wanted to go to college, at least a year, and my mom couldn't pay everything, so I have to work nine hours a week to pay my dorm bills, but it's fine, it's not that much." He says, and he talks so fast that Bill can feel the electricity going on in the boy's mind, rushing in the boy's body. He finishes to prepare Bill's meal in silence, asks him for money, then smiles at him. 

 

Bill thinks he met him in another life. Bill thinks that maybe, he wrote a story about him. He looks at his name tag, and there's a simple "Eddie" written on it, with the second D written with another marker, as if the person who wrote the name was wrong on how many d's there were in his name. "Thanks." 

 

After that, Bill goes more and more to buy low-quality sandwiches, and sometimes he's there, sometimes he's not, but that doesn't change a thing, because it's not like he knew him or was his friend, anyway.

 

***

He makes all sorts of friends : all from different courses, and he's happy that he got to meet so many. There's drama, relations between the people he meets, and it fuels him with ideas of stories, and he writes when he finds time. He shares most of his life with them, and mostly Grace. He finds himself stuck in one of his friends' couch, touching their feet while they read books for their classes, with a cup of tea that just ends up being forgotten on the dining table. Grace looks at Bill from her book, her eyes just above it. Bill feels her stare on him, and he shuts his own. "What?" He asks, a smile on his face. He likes her - not in that way, but he enjoys spending time with her in every way. He enjoys studying with her, he enjoys partying, he enjoys watching movies, he enjoys it all. "Let's forget about Hemingway and let's drink some alcohol and listen to cool songs and party in general." She says, a grin oh her lips. 

 

"With who?" he asks, restraining a quiet laugh. "With me, and my roomie. She's always up to party. I have like, eight beers in the fridge, that's enough to be funny but not enough to make us stupid either." She pokes his leg with her bare foot, and he stands up, "You're gross. But yeah, okay, I just have to go back to my own dorm to sleep." She finally closes her book, and runs to the other girl's room. She knocks on the door, "Beverly?" to what she gets an answer: "The walls are fucking thin, and I heard the plan, I'm in." She opens, and she's wearing a yellow top, already in her pj's, with big socks on. The first time Bill saw her, he thought she was from one of his own stories, one of his own dreams - it was as if he had found his first love again. He figured after two weeks that what he mistaken for love feelings was just a deep friend crush, and stopped himself from trying anything. She was too good for him: she was too pretty, too brave, too smart. And she talked in a way his parents wouldn't like. 

 

It didn't meant that he wasn't lurking when she wasn't looking. He still had this vibe of "first-love" coming from her, and he couldn't understand why. He felt like he loved her, once, but it was finished, there was no feelings anymore but he still had bellyache coming from good memories. Good memories he couldn't remember. 

 

Grace started the radio, who screamed a hit song in every corner of the room. She jumped right with the rhythm until she was in the kitchen, and came back with the same enthusiasm, beers in her hands. Beverly caught one as quickly as she could, opened it, and before bringing it to her lips, she dared Bill with her eyes and with her words. "Daring you two to chug one." She says jokingly, and Grace stops her with her mother-kind-of-look, "We have eight beers, honey, if we do that, they're gone in seconds." Beverly rolls her eyes, fakes a pout, "Yes, but it's funnier that way." As she says that, she starts to chug her own. Grace lets out a sigh, followed by a laugh, giving Bill a beer. He takes it and wants to do the same as the redhead girl, but it sparkles too much for him to complete his mission. He's happy that Beverly doesn't see his missed attempt. 

 

They sat on the couch, Beverly sat on the ground, her head rested in between Grace's legs, and they talked about their classes - the people they met this month, how much work they had to do, how cute was the cashier, "No, Bill- you don't understand how cute!" says Beverly, he says he misses his parents but he'll see them in a few months, Grace adds that her brother is the one she wants to see right now, and they change subject before crying. He tells them that it's been a while since he ate a good pizza, not the frozen kind - not the restaurant kind, "Those are too good, we're still students with students bank accounts," he precises, but the delivery kind. Beverly says that they can order some, but only if "Bill moves his ass to open the window because it's fucking hot in here," and he's not sure if it's actually hot or if it's because the girl drank three beers in so little time. 

 

He goes to the window - which is actually a balcony, and he opens it. Without thinking, his feet lead him to go on it, attracted by the sunset that waits for him outside. He likes the breeze that touches his skin, slowly kissing him. He gets lost in his thoughts and the moment lasts for a second that feels like it's a thousand of seconds, until he hears someone clearing their throat. "Hm," he gets taken away from his quick daydream.

 

"Do you have a lighter?" the voice asks, unsure. Bill turns around, and there's a boy on another balcony, next to his right. Bill think he doesn't look like the kind of person that would smoke, he's too clean to smoke, but clothes don't always mean personality. His hair is full of curls, and Bill feels like he could write a book on them, how they look like they're battling against each other for supremacy, but also tangling in a loving way, he sees the curls as bodies cuddling, then as waves splashing tourists watching the sea, then he thinks it's trees branches, then he thinks it's a bird nest, with small birbs playing in his head - then Bill stops himself, because it's not the place or time to start stories about hair. 

 

"Uh, I don't - I don't have a lighter, but uh-" He says, lost, takes a second to share his eyes with the other boy's - they're brown. They're brown and everyone thinks brown is dull, but Bill's mind sees sunsets, he sees tea in a day with rain, he sees sweet honey, he sees way more. His mom would've looked at the boy's eyes and would've said that it's not brown - it's mordoré. He stops himself from daydreaming again, then turns around so the girls can hear him inside, "Hey, does any of you have fire?" Beverly takes one from her pocket and gives it to Grace, who pouts. "You're such a lazy ass, Bevvie." She stands up, and joins Bill on the small balcony. It's big enough for two, but it would fall if they were three. He sees how her eyes parted when she saw the other boy, "curled-hair boy with a stupid pastel blue polo", he jokingly calls him in his head.

 

"Oh. Hi Stan. I had no idea that you smoke." She says, joking, but a touch of anger of her voice - the one that you would use for a kid that wants to eat a candy that just fell on the ground.

 

He takes the lighter off her hand, uses it, then answers. "I don't," he says simply, and it's so sure and certain than Bill trusts him, even if he's smoking at the moment. "Well, you have a cigarette in your mouth, like, right now, so it's smoking. It's fine, I understand, but most people start when they're at a party, or during finals stress. Which is not your case." She points, and it isn't a reproach, it's more of an affirmation. Stan takes a drag, exhales it, and Bill thinks that he got stuck in the middle of a painting that wasn't made for him to see it, but he can't stop watching. He loves art.

 

"I know, I just wanted one. Just one. I'm not going to continue, I can stop myself, I'm stronger than," he looks at his cigarette and stops, merely a second, "this. It makes me somehow nostalgic." Grace rolls her eyes, and Bill wants to do the same, because the sentence was so cliché. "Well. Fine, I trust you," she says, taking back the lighter, and before she gets to finish her sentence, curled hair boy with a stupid pastel blue polo speaks up, "I thought you didn't do boys." he looks at Bill, and in a glare he scans him. Bill never felt so naked in his clothes.

 

Grace laughs, "I don't." Bill sees how the situation is now reversed. "Well, you have a boy on your balcony, like, right now." He copies her exact sentence and when there's no cigarette on his lips, it's a smirk. "I know. I just wanted one. Just one." She jokes, before adding: "This is Bill, we're in literature together. I'm surprised you two haven't met yet." 

 

Yes, I'm surprised too, thinks Bill - because he gets that feeling, the one he had with the sandwich boy, the one he had with Beverly. He thinks that in front of him stands a character of his own imagination, one that he knows everything of, because he created him of all pieces. He gets this impression of déjà-vu, but it's not a moment, it's a person. He's completely lost in what he sees, he's in a bliss. The boy wearing a polo could be himself, or a long-lost friend, or a cousin, or his soulmate, or all of these at the same time, Bill wouldn't find it weird. There was this aura around him - this feeling that Bill knew him, like he knew Eddie, like he knew Beverly, like he knew himself.

 

"We haven't met, indeed, but UMaine is big, Grace. 11 000 students are here. It's normal that I haven't cross paths with -" he makes a hand gesture, asking for his name. "Bill." He answers himself, and that's the first time he speaks in minutes. "Bill." repeats Stan, then takes a drag. "You spend too much time in the library." Starts Grace as an answer. "How do you even find time to eat?" she asks as a joke. "Hm, it's 'Livia," he says, "she makes nice sandwiches." The way he says it makes it very serious, but the sentence itself is a joke. "Talking about that, I have pasta on my fire right now, and I'm sure if I don't check up, Olivia will burn the whole place down." He turns his head, then outstretch his arm towards Bill, and in a reflex he takes his cigarette without a thought, as if Stan wanted him to have it. He thinks for a second that Stan won't be back and that he's stuck with a half-finished cigarette in his hand, but Stan comes back. "It's fine, no fire." 

Grace rolls her eyes, and goes back inside, eyeing Bill, silently telling him to follow her, to come back with her. He gives Stan the cigarette, then hesitates before he speaks. "It's maybe a- uhm, - madeleine de Proust." He says, with a horrible french accent. He hears a quiet laugh coming from the other balcony, coming from the curled hair boy. "A what? What is what?" Bill licks his dry lips. He takes his broken thoughts and arranges them.

 

"The reason why you want to smoke. It's maybe a madeleine de Proust. You don't know it?" He asks, his reference now stupid in front of someone who doesn't have any literature skills. Stan inhales smoke, exhales the same smoke, then says no with his head. 

 

"It's in french literature. Proust wrote a lot on his childhood. He says that one day, he ate a madeleine that he dipped in tea, and suddenly when it was in his mouth, it felt good. Very, very good." He pauses, "Like, nostalgic good. Loving-good. A feeling that's so good that you could cry. And he - Proust, yeah, well Proust tried to understand what was going on, why the feeling was so intense, and the more he tried to eat a madeleine the less it was there - the feeling, I mean, and it was as if his grip was less strong the closer he tried to get to what it meant." Bill had no idea why he was telling the other boy this; he just felt like he needed to talk to him. To be his friend, to make links, connections. Would that be cool with him? 

 

"It's just nostalgia but it's stronger than it. It's nostalgia that is linked to childhood memories, to something you haven't done in a while, haven't ate in a while, haven't heard in a while. Do you have any cigarettes memories?" He asks, trying to see where Stan's nostalgia came from. 

 

Stan was looking at him, and Bill could see how lost he was - lost in his thoughts, lost in Bill's thoughts - but also lost in Bill's eyes. He was gone for a second, before he told him: 

 

"I don't have memories of my childhood. Well, I have some, but between eight and thirteen? nothing, at all." 

 

Me too, thought Bill, me too. This wasn't a thing to answer. It wasn't about him. He decided to say nothing, but to give him a head sign, added a soft smile, locked eyes once more with the boy - then Bill went back to see Grace and Beverly, and took another beer. 

 

Bill didn't want to see Stan crush his cigarette - writer at heart, he thought that actions have significance. If he was there when Stan started his cigarette, he had to be there to see him finish it. That way it would have locked the circle, buckled the buckle, it would be over. Meeting Stan, leaving Stan, not seing him again because it isn't needed. Something told him, whispered in his ear that if he didn't see Stan finish his cigarette, it meant that at some point, he'll need to see him finish one. It's an obligation, a rule: if you see something start, you have to see it end. If he stops himself from staying, he wouldn't see him finishing it, so he will be obligated to see him smoke others. Other cigarettes, like Proust ate more madeleines. 

 

Stan finished his cigarette alone. He thought it was the last one, but Bill had just started some weird fate over him - pushing him into a decision that wasn't exactly his.

 

There was only one person on this earth who could tell them why Stan was feeling that way, that Bill was right - it was, indeed, a madeleine de Proust, hidden in the depths of his sea of thoughts, kept locked in a cave that no one could ever enter, not Stan himself. There was only one person on this earth who could remind them that Stan wanted, that Stan needed that cigarette because he needed to think about Richie and Beverly. The taste, mostly the smell of cigarettes gave him flashbacks of their friendship that they shared in the summer 86. But Stanley Uris, much like Bill Denbrough, had forgotten everything - a curse that happens to six of the seven losers. 

 

There was only one person on this earth who still remembered everything, and it was Mike Hanlon.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope u liked it! If you do don't hesitate to leave a comment (it makes my entire day,,,) and gives me motivation!  
> If you want to talk, send headcanons, or whatev, my tumblr is @guccimikewheeler!


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